


A Thousand Times Over

by DictionaryWrites



Series: Hard Choices [1]
Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Abuse, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Body Horror, Coercion, Complicated Relationships, Consent Issues, Desperation, Emotional Manipulation, Forced Pregnancy, M/M, Mild Gore, Multiverse, POV Thor (Marvel), Past Rape/Non-con, Plot, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Post-Thor (2011), Power Dynamics, Serious Injuries, Sibling Incest, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-08
Updated: 2018-08-05
Packaged: 2019-06-07 06:46:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15213476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DictionaryWrites/pseuds/DictionaryWrites
Summary: Three days after he let himself fall from the Bifrost after the events of Thor (2011), Loki returns to Asgard.It isn't the same Loki. Nothing's the same ever again.





	1. What Is Lost Is Found Again

**Author's Note:**

> Not only would I advise you to heed the warnings, but I would stress that this is a very dark universe with very dark happenings. Relationships are complicated, and decisions aren't easy. It's gonna be horrible, and the happy ending will be bittersweet.

Three days after falling from the Bifrost, Loki returns to Asgard.

Stumbling with a hand about his waist and his eyes half-lidded in agony and fatigue, Loki drops to his knees as he enters the throne hall of the palace, and it is as if the world stops. Father sits upon his throne, staring down at his son returned with Mother at his side, and Thor stands before the Warriors Three and Sif, midway through their report on the repairs to the Bifrost.

Loki is pallid, his skin having taken on a chalky complexion, and where he bends over, his hand trembling, Thor can see the slit in his belly. Blood spatters on the ground, thick and lilac in colour, and behind his hand, Thor can see his guts, ready to fall.

Loki raises his head, slowly, and stares at them all.

“I killed him,” he says softly. “I do hope you’re grateful.” His hair is longer than it was when he left. Much longer – now it comes down to his shoulders, and his face is… Different. His eyes are more sunken, and with a harder edge to them now; his cheekbones seem starker, more defined, his jaw stronger, and that armour – blue? Yellow? Thor’s never seen the like on Loki before.

Loki drops to his knees, and Fandral runs across the room.

Thor stares as Fandral catches Loki’s cheek, yelling at one of the Einherjar to call for a healer – always the first to forgive Loki’s injustices, was Fandral. Always.

Loki must be delirious – he must be mad. Because he laughs, laughs loud, and he kisses Fandral on the mouth. Fandral freezes, his hands outstretched on either side, and Loki falls limp onto the ground, his head lolled ugly to the side. Fandral’s hand goes to his mouth, now stained with Loki’s blood, and he turns askance to Thor, looking _horrified_.

Thor has no answers.

None of them do.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

Loki is awake as they work on him. He watches impassively as the healers draw up the wounds in his gut with painful, burning seiðr – it must be agony, Thor _knows_ it is agony, because he has felt that cauterising, cleansing magic draw up wounds in his arms and sides and legs before, felt the way it crackles and sizzles as the skin is forced back together.

Loki doesn’t even flinch.

“My shoulder is dislocated,” he says quietly when they’re finished, and immediately Eir moves forward, reaching for his right shoulder. Evidently, Loki is being truthful, because Eir frowns, and shifts her hands suddenly, popping it back into place.

Again, Loki does not grunt. Does not shift away. Just permits it.

He meets Thor’s gaze, and he’s—

“You’re not Loki,” Thor says.

“Wrong,” Loki whispers. “You’re looking at the evidence, but you’re drawing the wrong conclusion. As is your wont.” He’s— He’s _older_ , somehow. The Loki that fell from the Bifrost was like Thor, still a young man, but this man is _jaded_. Jaded, and old.

“How old are you?” Thor demands. Loki smiles, showing his teeth, and he points at Thor with an elegant index finger, tapping the air.

“See? You always were more intelligent than people gave you credit for, brother. That’s a little closer to the target.”

“How old?”

“Older than you.”

“ _How old?”_

“Old.” Thor clenches his hands into fists, shifting forward, but Eir puts her hand on his chest, and prevents him from moving forward. Loki smiles, but this time, it doesn’t meet his eyes. Leaning back on the bed, he looks toward the door, and Thor follows his gaze. Father is moving forward, and Loki puts out his hand. Father stares at it, uncomprehending. “It won’t bite, Father. Hold my hand.”

“You have committed crimes against Asgard and her people,” Father says slowly. He doesn’t take the hand, but Loki keeps it outstretched, his expression politely.

“Have I? When?” His tone is so casual, so easy.

“ _Treason_.”

“Treason? Against whom?”

“Against the throne!” Father thunders. Loki arches his eyebrows, seemingly unimpressed. “You allowed Frost Giants into Asgard.”

“I think you’ll find _you_ did that long before I ever did, Father,” Loki says softly. Thor swallows. The truth about Loki’s heritage, Mother and Father had explained the evening after his fall, and it had wrenched him so _entirely_. To grow up despising the Frost Giants, to hate them, and all along, Loki… “Take my hand, won’t you? I’m cold.”

“You are cold,” Father agrees quietly: it’s a condemnation, and it makes Loki laugh, his head shifting on the pillow. Thor thinks of Mother, who always drags her fingers over her palms, her fingers, when she is anxious: Loki’s hands are held entirely still. Where is Mother, he wonders? Overcome with emotion, at seeing her son alive when three days ago, he was almost certainly dead? “You would have had Laufey kill me.”

“Untrue. I lured Laufey here with the promise of your head, all the better to kill him with. Isn’t that what you wanted, Father? For me to renounce my heritage and pronounce loyalty to _Asgard_ instead?” Loki laughs, and this time, it’s utterly mad. It comes from low in his throat, and it echoes off the arching walls and ceilings of the infirmary. He is still weak, and it shows in the slight loll of his head on the pillow even as his laughter trails slowly off. Biting his lower lip, he continues to smile, and Thor feels _sick_. In the past three days, he has grieved and he has grieved, wondering if Loki is truly dead, but this? This isn’t— “I’ll repair the Bifrost, if you like.”

“You don’t have the power to repair the Bifrost,” Father says. “You foolish—” Loki snaps his fingers. Nothing happens. Father frowns, but Loki gestures for him to continue.

“No, no, go on. It will become apparent in… Oh, six minutes.”

“You’re _mad_ ,” Thor says.

“You’re quite right,” Loki says, and then he laughs again. “I am. I’m _mad_. What a thought. You always say that – you’ve always— As if my _madness_ is something that has happened in isolation, incubated from an egg that was laid by no bird, and no reptile besides. Won’t you take my hand, Father?”

“I’m not going to take your hand!” Father snaps. Loki sighs, taking the hand back and settling his chin upon his palm.

“Honestly, anyone would think I’d done something truly _dreadful_. It’s not as if I’ve brought about Ragnarok. Yet.” Loki giggles, and then he reaches up, running a hand through his hair. There’s a loop of silver through the shell of his left ear, a loop that wasn’t there before, and from it hangs a medallion of hard metal— “ _Touchy_ ,” Loki chides, but Thor ignores him, feeling the silver symbol beneath his fingers. It’s a symbol of Mjolnir, but more than that, the metal… Thor’s hand goes to the hammer on his hip. Mjolnir is there, whole, complete, and yet this ornament, this thing hanging from Loki’s ear, is of the same resonance, the same _frequency_. When Thor’s fingers brush against it, he can feel it thrum.

“ _Curiouser and curiouser, cried Alice! She was so much surprised, for in that moment she forgot how to speak good English_ ,” Loki murmurs, more to himself than to Thor and their father. It sounds like a quote, but it’s not a quote from any book Thor has ever heard of, not a quote Thor recognizes. Realisation is sinking slowly into Thor’s bones. Loki is truly mad, this time. He isn’t just different – he’s cracked, _shattered_.

It’s growing very cold. Thor frowns, turning as the light seems to dim – the light from outside. Some cloud, he expects, but ordinarily he would feel the rain clouds begin to gather in the sky before they grew large enough to block the light of the sun, and the forecast today had been bright indeed. The sun seems…

Thor realises that he is looking directly _at_ the sun, and feels next to nothing. No strain on his eyes. The barest warmth on his cheeks.

“Oh, _four_ minutes,” Loki says. “My apologies – a miscalculation on my part.”

“What—”

“I doused the sun,” Loki says casually, examining his nails. “I can set it alight again, if you like. You’d best ask me _quickly_ , though, before everybody on the planet freezes to death.” Father is behind Thor, staring forth, and Thor can feel the tension in his Father’s body.

“It’s a trick,” Thor says.

“Is it?” Loki asks sweetly.

“It isn’t,” Father whispers. His single eye is concentrated on the sun, and Thor can see the horror on his face, the genuine _terror_. He has never seen his Father frightened like this, never, _never_ …

“You always were frightened I’d become like Hela, weren’t you?” Loki asks. Hela? Who is _Hela_? “Well, you must no longer worry of such things, Father! I am so much _worse_.” The windows rattle in their fastenings, and Father turns a slow stare onto Loki in his infirmary bed. “Shall I turn it back on?”

After the longest pause, a pause that seems to stretch into boundless infinity, and yet cannot be more than five seconds, Father nods. Another snap of the fingers, and Thor turns his head away as the sun flares back to its brightness, burning at his eyes and gently warming his cheeks.

“Who are you?” Father asks, slowly. Loki’s mischievous expression fades. It’s like the fading of the sunlight, in a way: it freezes, then slowly shifts away, until his lips are downturned, and Loki’s bright eyes are dull.

“Won’t you hold my hand, Father?” Loki asks softly, _desperately_. “It’s been so long.” Thor watches his Father, thinks of the moment before Loki let go, the way he had looked to Father so— But it must be a trick. If Father touches him, surely, something will happen, something…

Father holds out his hand, and Loki snatches at it, pressing their palms together and interlinking their thumbs. Nothing happens – nothing outwardly. But Loki relaxes, just slightly on the bed, and he lets out a sob. The crying is sudden, and it is nothing like the laughter, which had been biting and frightening, which had shocked through the air.

Loki bows his head, and he clenches his eyes tight shut, as if he’s trying not to cry. For just a moment, Thor sees in him the little brother he has always known.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

“How long have you been gone?”

“Three days.”

“From your perspective, how long?”

“What matters my perspective?” Thor crosses his arms tight over his chest, and he looks down at Loki. Loki reaches for the glass of water on the bedside table, and he takes a slow drink of it. They are in Loki’s quarters now, instead of in the infirmary. It has been six hours since Loki stumbled back to Asgard, and he is visibly healthier than he was. His skin has lost its sallow look, and the whiteness of the skin seems more uniform, more natural to Loki’s face. There remain shadows beneath his eyes for lack of sleep, but they are less sunken in, and his lips are no longer dry and chapped and bleeding.

Father has gone to deliver news of Loki’s return to the Council of Gods – it is all he can say. Loki will answer no questions, and those he chooses to play with he replies with cryptic non-answers.

Defeated, Thor sits on the edge of Loki’s bed, and Loki watches him. He is dressed in loose pyjamas, the silk of the sleepshirt and trousers clinging to the tight form of his chest, and the muscle of his thighs. Thor doesn’t look downward – he has never allowed himself to indulge in his more illicit desires.

“What _will_ you tell me?” Thor asks, softly.

“That I love you,” Loki says. “More than anything. More than everything, a thousand times over.” It seems so honest. It seems so _true_. Loki says it with such intensity, and Thor sees his slight shift upon the bed, sees the way he leans forward and brushes his fingers over the side of Thor’s shoulder. They’re freezing cold, more cold than they ever have been, and Loki’s eyes are soft.

“Why did you do it?” Thor asks in a whisper. “Why did you let me stay down there, on Midgard? You would have killed me.” It is the first time Thor has asked a question about the _before_ , instead of the aftermath, and Loki watches him for the longest few moments, his blue eyes full to the brim with emotion – what emotion, Thor cannot surmise.

“I love you,” Loki repeats, and he lies back on the bed. Shifting his position, he moves to lie on his left side, his bare feet brushing against Thor’s thigh. “I paid a steep price to be here. I don’t know that I ought have.”

“What price?” Thor asks.

“A thousand,” Loki says.

“A thousand what?” Thor presses. “Credits? Spells?”  Loki’s eyes close, and he acts as if he doesn’t hear what Thor says – perhaps he doesn’t. Perhaps he doesn’t.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

Loki leans heavily on a cane at the edge of the arena, heavily favouring his left side. He wears light, loose robes that hang down toward his calves, and he doesn’t wear a belt, meaning that he is given a sort of boxy figure. It must hurt, to wear belts. Thor stops in his sparring with Hogun, and the five of them turn to look at him.

“Oh, don’t stop on my account,” he says casually. Volstagg’s expression is sour, and he twists his lips. Fandral takes a step forward, but then he seems to hesitate, and Loki smiles like a predator. “Don’t you want to step closer, Fandral?” Loki asks softly, and Thor feels a twitch of jealousy in his chest – what is this new infatuation with _Fandral_ , of all men?

“What will you do to me if I do?” Fandral asks. There’s a hunger in Fandral’s eyes, a kind of fascination – Fandral always did like to flirt with danger. Fandral has always liked to flirt with anything.

“Nothing you wouldn’t _beg_ for me to do a second time,” Loki purrs, and Thor can see Fandral shiver before stepping back once more, returning to his spar with Sif. Chuckling, Loki sinks slowly onto the bench, and he rests with his back against the tall walls.

A decision about Loki has not yet been made. The debate at the Council of Gods had gone on for hours. Loki cannot be trusted – on that, they all agree. Loki is dangerous – on that, they all agree. But can he bound? Can he be fettered? Is it worth the _attempt_ , when he is as dangerous as he is, when he can now douse the very sun?

Loki watches them train with a distant smile on his face, as if he hasn’t seen them train in a million years. There is a shine in his eyes, but it disappears beneath the easy shimmer of an illusion.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

“I can’t eat that,” Loki says, disgust showing on his face, and he shoves the soup away from him. It’s a caramelised onion soup – nothing exciting, nothing they’ve not eaten for thousands of years, but Loki looks _sick_ at the very thought.

“You haven’t eaten anything all night,” Mother murmurs, concerned. “Do you eat _anything_ anymore?”

“Don’t worry,” Loki says softly, and he puts his hand on Mother’s hand, offering her a gentle smile. “I don’t— I don’t _have_ to eat, actually. But I prefer to. But not… It’s much too sweet. I couldn’t possibly.”

“You don’t eat sweet things anymore?” Thor asks, softly.

“Jötnar don’t really like sweetness. It fills me with nausea, makes me gag,” Loki murmurs. He reaches for a slice of thick bread, a rye with seeds in it, and he begins to eat it slowly. Methodically, he tears it into tiny pieces barely bigger than his thumbnail, and he eats them one by one. It’s difficult not to watch him. It’s difficult not to stare at the way he eats now, so unnaturally, so slowly.

So different.

“You’re a Jötunn, then,” Father says. “You call yourself a Jötunn. And yet you keep the white skin.”

“Skin is just skin,” Loki says simply. “I am what I am: it matters not how I decorate myself.” Thor looks to the medallion shining at his ear. Mother is watching him with a quiet concern in her eyes, as she has done at a thousand family dinners, at a hundred thousand. “What you did to me was wrong. You realise that, I hope.”

There is a silence at the table.

“We took you in,” Father says, slowly, measuredly. He is inhaling and exhaling with a slow rhythm, as if to prevent himself from losing his temper. “We brought you home from the—”

“Yes, yes, you are my greatest benefactor, et cetera, it was a kindness, certainly,” Loki says, waving his hand without care. “But to raise me without knowing what I was, to allow the people to go on hating my kind, to let me believe _I_ was a monster… That was wrong. That is inexcusable. You understand this, yes?”

“We loved you,” Mother says. “Don’t you believe that?”

“Loving something doesn’t mean you can destroy it as you please,” Loki says softly. “Love cannot soothe wounds that you inflict, and reopen time and time again. Love isn’t enough. Care is so much more important. Do you know how many things I have loved, and let burn before me because I thought—” Loki stops short. There isn’t anger in his tone. Sighing softly, Loki smiles, the curve of his lips slow and easy, and he wipes the crumbs from his hands. “I don’t need to eat,” Loki says. “I’ll retire to my quarters.”

“Loki,” Mother says. “We always—”

“I’m not angry at you, Mother,” Loki says softly. “You did as you thought was best.” He reaches out, dragging his fingers over her cheek, and when she flinches at the cold, the apple of Loki’s throat bobs, and he retracts his hand. “As did I.”

He walks away. He walks away, and none of them move to stop him.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

“You said you killed somebody,” Thor says. They are out in Iðunn’s orchard, and Loki is sitting with his legs crossed beneath him, looking at his reflection in the water. His hair is tied up in a loose bun, and he dresses in off-world clothing, wearing a sand-coloured blouse and brown trousers, his feet clad in sandals. It’s the most skin Thor’s ever seen him display outside of the palace walls: he can see the nape of his neck, bared by the bun, sees Loki’s chest under the opened collar, sees his forearms where the sleeves are rolled up, sees so much of his _feet_.

He looks beautiful, hauntingly so, and Thor feels his long-held desire to kiss his brother, to hold him close, burn in his belly. How much would Loki hate him if he knew? How much would Loki _despise_ him?

“I’ve killed many somebodies,” Loki says.

“You said, _I killed him_ ,” Thor says slowly. “ _I do hope you’re grateful._ ”

“I was delirious,” Loki says. “Half-mad and with my innards tumbling from my belly. It hardly matters what I said.”

“Who was it?” Thor asks. “Who did you kill?”

“I had to pay for the privilege,” Loki says. He reaches out, dragging a bare finger through the edge of the spring, and Thor watches as the still water is distorted, ripples shifting through the form of Loki’s reflection and ruining its definition, so that Loki is just a mess of brown and white and black in the water, in roughly human form. “I begged him. Said that I’d do anything, _anything_ , if he would only send me back, and make it so that it wouldn’t happen again… And he said _anything? Really? You’d do anything?_ And I said _yes_. What a fool I was. So young and so stupid.” Loki continues to trace his index finger through the water, leaving his reflection still a mess. “But I was his favourite, you see. He was willing to give me a gift, if I underwent enough pain. Enough torture.”

“Who did you kill?” Thor asks.

“His name was Thanos,” Loki says. “You don’t know his name – now, you never will. He was a Titan. He was meant to be eternal – nothing should have killed him. But I did. I did…” Loki puts his hand on his belly. “I can’t believe that I… I always wanted children, you know. It’s all that I ever wanted, and every time, every time— It was so unfair. He did it so… It was so _unfair_. He made me choose, between you, and between _her_ , and I—" He isn’t making sense. No sentence seems connected to the one before it, and Loki shakes in his place, breathing shakily.

Loki’s head is bowed. The reflection slowly fades into nothingness, however, and Thor can see Loki’s face, see his wide, tearful eyes, see his lilac cheeks, sees the tears run down his cheeks in fat, ugly drops.

“It was masterful, really,” Loki whispers. “Grandmaster is the right word.” Thor doesn’t understand a thing. Loki is talking absolute nonsense, barely making sense, but it hurts him to see Loki in so much pain, in so much visible agony, and Thor feels like his heart is being wrenched from his _chest_.

He drops to his knees beside his brother, and he sets his hand on Loki’s shoulder. Loki immediately turns toward him, desperately, and he puts his hands on Thor’s cheeks. His hands are cold, but Thor feels his heart surge at the sensation. Loki leans in, as if he’s going to— Loki isn’t going to kiss him, he couldn’t possibly, _can’t_ —

Loki stops himself, frozen, with a few inches between Thor’s mouth and Loki’s.

“I love you,” Loki repeats softly. “Do you understand? I _love_ you. I would do anything for you, anything, anything – I’ve done so much for _you_ , and I’ve made so many mistakes, and I know that I’m cruel, and ugly, and selfish, but you are _everything_ …” Thor’s mouth is dry. Loki is clutching at him like he thinks Thor is about to throw him off, clutching at him so desperately he seems like he might yet crumble into dust. And then Loki is breaking apart, crying, _wailing_ like a mad man, and Thor pulls him into a crushing hug. He feels Loki shudder against his chest, feels his tears wet and freezing against Thor’s shoulder, feels Loki clutch him as if he might just _die_ …

“I love you too, brother,” Thor says helplessly. He knows not what else to say. He thinks of the way Loki had leaned in, as if to _kiss_ him— “I love you too.”

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

“Tell me what happened to you,” Thor says quietly. It is late evening, and they are sat in Loki’s quarters. Loki lies on his back on the bed, his hand on his belly. His eyes are faraway.

“It’s not a pleasant story. You don’t want to hear it.”

“I do.”

“I know you better than you know yourself, Thor,” Loki says. “You don’t.” Thor watches his brother, watches him for the longest time. _I know you better than you know yourself_ – is that true? It can’t be true. And yet Loki always seems so easily to predict Thor’s actions. _Loki tried to kill him_.

“Tell me anyway,” Thor says.

“Would you like me to repair the Bifrost?” Loki asks. “If we do not act with haste, the Nine Realms will break out in chaos. Nidavellir will be attacked; Vanaheim will be attacked; Alfheim will be attacked. They will know Asgard cannot exercise its power… And outsiders will take their chance to invade.”

“How long will it take?”

“An hour.” Thor watches his brother.

“How much power do you command now?” Thor asks. Loki laughs.

“Don’t ask questions you don’t wish to know the answer to,” he advises softly, and he takes up his cane, leading the way from his quarters.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

The power crackling in the air is electrifying. Loki stands on the edge of the Bifrost, his hands outstretched, and Thor watches as the Bifrost grows like a _tree_ at a thousand times its usual speed, watches the crystal shift and altar as if it is something organic, something alive. Heimdall stands beside him, and Thor looks at his face.

Heimdall is watching Loki with a slight frown on his face, his deep brows furrowed, his nose wrinkled slightly. There is no fear in his eyes when he looks at Loki, but there is a caution, an uncertainty, deep-set and unavoidable.

“Do you know?” Thor asks. “What happened to him?” Heimdall slowly shakes his head.

“I saw him fall from the Bifrost, and into the depths of space,” Heimdall says quietly. “He left my sight, falling through voids and wormholes, falling through distant, everpresent nothingness… And then he appeared once more in a flash of light, at the very entrance to the throne hall. It wasn’t a teleportation, it wasn’t… It was like the universe just snapped him from place to here, in completion. But he isn’t the Loki we lost. He is much older.”

Loki raises his hands, and lighting crackles on the air, healing a cracked seam in the crystal shift of the Bifrost’s bridge.

It doesn’t even take an hour. It takes, at best, forty minutes.

The whole city of Asgard is watching in fascination and in terror, watching the power their prince wields – for the people, of course, know naught of what has truly transpired – and when Loki finishes, he takes up his cane once more, and begin to limp slowly toward the palace.

The people part like a sea to let him past. It should make Loki smile, to see them so respect him, to let him through amidst them, but Thor thinks he sees him flinch.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

“Loki,” Thor hears Eir’s voice say, and he freezes just outside the drawing room, listening at the door. “Your… Your belly.” There is a long silence. Thor wishes he could see their faces, wishes he could see what was going on. “You were—”

“Yes, I was,” Loki says. “Rather more aggressive than your average Caesarean, wouldn’t you say?” Thor’s blood is like ice in his veins. _Caesarean_. Loki means he was— He was _pregnant_. Is such a thing possible, for a man, even a man like Loki, even a shapeshifter?

“Where is the baby, Loki?” Eir asks softly, her voice full to the brim with concern, with apprehension. Loki with a baby – Loki with a _child_ , and that child is elsewhere, now, somewhere far across the universe, somewhere apart from him. A _newborn_ , ripped from Loki’s very gut…

“With her father,” Loki says. “She’s hale and hearty, I’m sure. She will fare better than the others.”

“What others?” Eir asks sharply.

“Oh, nothing, Eir. Nothing, nothing. As you know, I had no children before her.” It’s said with such melancholy that Thor cannot stand it – such grief. “I can feel her, feel her… Her magic. She’s safe. She’s well.”

“What happened?” Eir asks. For the longest time, Thor knows, Eir has been their healer. Eir had healed their skinned knees as children, set their broken bones and knitted together their torn flesh, soothed their battle wounds, _helped_ them, loved them… But Loki is so different now. What, Thor wonders, has changed him so? What must Eir think, to see him like this?

“Everything,” Loki says. “A thousand times over.” And Thor hears one of them shift toward the door of the drawing room, and he cannot be heard eavesdropping, so he walks away.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

Thor stops short in the corridor outside Loki’s quarters, cautiously looking down the hall. Loki has Fandral pinned up against the wall, one of his white hands tight around Fandral’s throat, and Fandral is shivering slightly, looking up at Loki with his brown eyes wide.

“You’re very handsome,” Loki is murmuring, his voice carrying down the corridor. “You know that, of course – you know you’re handsome.” What is Fandral doing here? Had he been coming to Loki’s quarters, to visit him, _alone_? Would he be so foolish, when Loki looks at Fandral as if he himself is a wolf, and Fandral a rabbit he would devour?

“You’re different, my prince,” Fandral murmurs. “Different than you ever were before.”

“You don’t like it?”

“On the contrary,” Fandral demurs. “I rather  _do_ like it.” Loki kisses Fandral, savagely this time, biting into his mouth and kissing him so hard that Thor can see his knees _buckle_ , sees his legs so weak beneath him that Loki has to catch him before he falls. Loki bites at Fandral’s lower lip, dragging it under his teeth, and Thor hears Fandral moan.

Jealousy coils hot in his belly, low in his gut.

“I would destroy you,” Loki whispers. “Do you understand that? I would rip you to pieces and remake you again to my preferences.”

“Am I not already to your preferences, Loki?” Loki laughs, quietly, and the he smacks Fandral’s arse. Fandral jolts, heaving in a sudden gasp and shuddering, and Loki drags his teeth over the shell of Fandral’s ear.

“Don’t be a fool, darling,” Loki says, and he shoves Fandral away from him, making Fandral stumble. “Hold your hope in your belly… And you will have Loki. Within the year.”

“Talking about yourself in the third person, now?” Fandral asks, laughing quietly.

“No,” Loki says, but he laughs too. “Off you go. Send Thor in.”

“Thor?” Fandral repeats, and then he turns. Thor steps out into the middle of the corridor, and he sees the heady flush catch Fandral’s cheeks, sees the slight embarrassment… But despite it, he grins a proud grin. Fandral has never been ashamed of his desires, not of any of them – not even of the worst of them. “Your highness,” he says by way of greeting, and he gives a polite nod of his head.

“Fandral,” Thor says, and he passes him by in the corridor. Loki opens the door to his quarters, gesturing for Thor to join him inside, and Thor steps within. Loki’s quarters are as they ever were, with the same green decorations, the same silk sheets, but there are differences. His books… Are gone. The shelves are bare and empty, now, every single one of them, the floor-to-ceiling slats of wood seeming strange in a room ordinarily crowded with books on every side. “Where are your books?”

“I’ve read them too many times,” Loki mutters. “I’ll get rid of the shelves soon.” He reaches out, and he spreads his hand on Thor’s chest, slowly. He presses his palm right to the sternum, as if to feel the slow beat of Thor’s heart, steady and rhythmic. His hand slides up, then, over Thor’s neck, toward his cheek.

The want in his expression undeniable. The want, the desire, the desperate _lust_.

“We’re brothers,” Loki says quietly. “It would be wrong.” He says it as if it is Thor’s hand on _his_ cheek, and not Loki’s on his own. Thor feels guilt burst in his belly, feels it twist and shift and bubble, but then Loki’s impassive expression shifts. “But if it were so wrong, brother… Why would we both feel the _same way_? Why would we share this desire, if the universe didn’t will for us to satisfy it?”

It occurs to Thor that it’s as if Loki is speaking two lines that belong to different people – his intonation subtly changes, as if he is reading one line from a play, and then the next. It is strange, odd, uncertain…

Thor wants.

Thor wants to prove to himself that his brother, fallen from the Bifrost and so recently having attempted his murder, is alive. That he is alive, with a body, with a beating heart and working lungs… Thor wants to prove to himself that Loki _wants_ him. Wants to go beyond the desire in Loki’s eyes and the part of his lips. He wants to know, wants to know for now and always, that Loki loves him, loves him as Thor has always loved  _him_ , wants that confirmation more than life, than air, itself--

“Kiss me,” Loki says softly. “Kiss me, brother. It’s been so long.” _So long? So long_ —

Thor captures Loki’s mouth beneath his own in a desperate, crushing kiss, and Loki moans against his lips.


	2. The Nature of Cruelty

Loki kisses like he’s a hurricane, kisses him like he’s the storm Thor has always feigned control over, bites his way into Thor’s mouth and savages his neck, leaves him a mess of a thousand bruises before leaning down and swallowing Thor’s cock like it’s easy, like he’s done it a thousand times – a hundred thousand!

Thor comes with a shout, and Loki lies back slightly, clutching his injured side and hazily, half drowsily, letting his eyes close.

“You want me to—”

“No,” Loki mutters, his nose wrinkling in apparent disgust. “I’m not healed nearly enough.” He shift back on the bed, and Thor watches him as he summons his cane to his palm, leaning heavily on it to stand up from the bed. Limping to the balcony, he pushes the doors open, and Thor leans forward, quickly lacing up his breeches and moving to follow him.

Loki stands with his elbows rested against the balcony’s stonewall, looking out over the city. His expression is mournful, his lips downturned at their edges, and he sighs softly, leaning down a little more, as if to rest his elbows on the wall— Immediately, he groans in pain, and he shifts back, summoning a chair for himself. Thor watches, taking in a slow breath, as he sits back in the conjured seat, gripping at its arms, and he lets it raise him a little off the ground, so that he can look out over the city.

Thor reaches out, and with a delicate hand, he touches Loki’s thigh, which is on a level with Thor’s chest.

“You look—” Thor trails off. “I needn’t touch your belly, brother, I could merely taste you. Or perhaps massage your shoulders, maybe…” Thor gently kisses Loki’s knee, and Loki reaches out, touching his fingers through Thor’s hair. It feels uncomfortable, to have taken his pleasure of Loki’s mouth and given naught in return, but Loki’s expression betrays no desire for Thor’s reciprocation.

“Thor… The damage within me is internal. It is _within_ me, not merely from my gut.”

“I heard you— I heard you speaking with Eir. She said that you… That you birthed a child.” Loki, for a long few moments, says nothing. His expression remains quietly sad, grief shining in his watering eyes, and he drags his fingernails delicately over the fabric of Thor’s scalp, making Thor close his eyes and lean into it. Loki is so old, now, and Thor feels so young, so helpless… And to have given into a desire he has for so long held within him, to have let Loki— “I never knew,” Thor says. “That you reciprocated my… My desires.”

“I knew how you looked at me,” Loki says. He draws his hand away, and he sets his hands neatly in his lap, resting between his thighs, and he looks out over the city of Asgard. “I always knew. There was never a glance I did not notice, never a desperate touch I was not cognizant of. I knew how you desired me, since you were old enough to know what desire was.” Thor’s stomach flips. He feels a slight uncertain, a pressing bundle of nerves, within his chest, and he stares up at Loki, stares at Loki’s distant expression. “I… I feared your want of me, if truth be told. I was frightened that you should want me so much, when no one else wanted me at all.”

“Loki,” Thor says. “That isn’t true.” Loki laughs softly.

“You know, my darling,” he says, meeting Thor’s gaze. His expression is serious, but his eyes are not hard – they are soft of gaze, and full of woes untold. “That’s the thing all of you have never understood about truth. You call me the Silvertongue, you talk of my lies and my deceit, equating it with my mischief… But the thing none of you realise is that _truth_ applies to so few answers, to so few questions. Truth is a matter of perspective, Thor. You think of truth as seeing the whole landscape, when you are stood upon a hill with a torch in your hand, shining your spotlight on a tiny _speck_ of land in the darkness.” Loki exhales through his nose, and lays his chin on his hand. “Not that you should know better, of course: I would never expect you to.”

“The child,” Thor presses.

“A daughter, my daughter,” Loki murmurs. He swallows, and he squeezes his eyes shut.

“We must get her back,” Thor says, taking a step closer, gripping at Loki’s hip before Loki whimpers, and he drags his hand back with rapidity. “We must—”

“We can’t, Thor,” Loki says. “My daughter is off-limits to me, Thor. I made my choice.”

“Your choice, your choice! You keep talking about _your choice_ , but why—”

“I was given a choice between a life with you, and a life with my daughter, Thor – my daughter, my only daughter,” Loki says, lowly. His voice is but a rumble, dark and ringing out from his throat. “I chose you.” Loki lets out another low noise, like a huff, and then he lets out a ragged sob. “And I didn’t mean to.” Loki puts his head in his hands, and the way he cries is unbearable, the way that the tears run fat and hot down his cheeks, the way he lets out horrible, ugly whimpers, the way she _shakes_ in his chair.

And what is Thor to say? What is Thor to do? How can he comfort Loki, when he has had his child ripped from him, his daughter ripped from his very _belly_ , when he is crying, and crying? How can Thor do anything?

“What… What do you mean?” Thor asks softly, and he takes hold of the two legs of the chair, pulling it down. It moves smoothly, until the four legs of the chair settle gently against the floor, turned to face Thor, and Thor slowly gets to his knees. He reaches for Loki’s hands, delicately pulling them from his face, and he sees Loki’s expression: he is haggard and wet with his tears, his nose running, his lower lip bitten bloody. “What do you mean, you didn’t mean to?” He is trying so hard to keep his voice even, to keep it from cracking, and he squeezes Loki’s hands.

“He tricked me,” Loki says softly, brokenly. All that power, and yet he is _shattered_. “He knew I would pick her, every time, and he— He made me watch you…” Something changes in Loki’s expression, just for a second, and he says hurriedly, “He made me watch you die. A thousand times, he made me watch you die. So that when I came out of it, I was sobbing, distraught, could not bear it… And in that split second, I chose you.” Loki takes in a shuddering, rattling breath. “Now I have you – I am trapped here, with you. And my daughter is Norns know where. Stupid of me. Stupid, and sentimental.”

“I love you, brother,” Thor says softly, knowing not what else to say. “No matter what, I love you.”

“I know,” Loki whispers. “But that doesn’t make you worth it.” Thor leans back on his heels, feeling the words sink into him like the slice of a blade, and Loki tears his hands away from Thor’s. “I’m sorry, Thor. You— You love me, unconditionally, eternally. For you, I’m sure, there’s nothing in the universe more important than me. But, Thor…” Loki closes his eyes, his expression tortured. “I love you, Thor. I love you dearly. But you aren’t my daughter, and I regret the choice I made.” Thor hates the anger that burns hot inside him, hates his desire to close a hand around Loki’s throat and lash out at him, hates, _hates_ — “You love me, Thor, I know you do. But just like me…” Loki laughs bitterly, and he stands, the chair tumbling back from him. “You have chosen poorly.” With a flicker of green light, Loki disappears, and Thor is left on his own on the balcony of Loki’s quarters, staring at the space he had left.

Sinking into the gilded chair, Thor runs a hand through his hair, and he swallows, slowly. The tacit rejection, the confirmation that Loki regrets being at Thor’s side, regardless of what he chose, that is one thing. But the understanding, the understanding that Loki’s daughter, whoever, whatever she might be, is out there, somewhere, and Loki is here—

And it is Thor’s fault, isn’t it? Thor is the reason Loki made that choice – if it weren’t for Thor being here, Loki would _never…_

Thor closes his eyes, and he presses his head into his palm.

“Norns help me,” he whispers. It sounds like a plea, like a true prayer, for the first time in his life.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

In the coming days, Thor keeps his distance from Loki. Loki permits it, never draws too close to him – he does not catch Thor in the corridors, or even take his meals with Thor, Mother and Father. Instead, he retains his distance, distance from everybody. He spends a great deal of time settled on the wall of his balcony, his legs hanging down, his cane loosely clasped in his hands.

He is all but silent, and when anybody tries to speak to him, his lips will remain unmoving, his tongue still in his mouth, and he will walk away. He is restless, never able to remain completely still for more than a few minutes at a time: always, his knees will bounce, or his fingers will drag anxiously over one another, or he will bite his lip to bruising.

On the fifth day, Loki sets his cane aside. He walks unaided, now, and Thor sees him in the corridor of the palace, carefully pulling on a pair of gloves to match his armour. The set is unlike anything Thor has ever seen on him – it is made of silver plate, silver plate that seems as liquid upon his form, catching the light and shimmering as he moves. For once, he wears a longsword – a rapier – at his side, and a small, round shield that hangs from his arm and is so black that no light seems to touch it.

“Nice armour,” Thor says.

“Thank you,” Loki says. It is the first thing he has said to Thor since the balcony. “I’m going for a hike. I shall be back within the week.”

“Alone?” Thor asks.

“Yes,” Loki says primly. “The castle stifles me: I have desire of greener pastures. I will climb Himinbjorg.” Thor turns, looking through the archway that lets sunlight into the corridor. In the distance, he can see the silver peak of Himinbjorg, misted in fog. It is a great mountain, and while they have climbed it before, while they have taken the journey up the steep ground and rock… That was a long time ago.

“Why?” Thor demands. Loki smiles at him, then shifts the shield, flipping it onto his back. It hangs there like it’s held in place by some sort of magnetic clasp, or a magical one, and looking at him, in his silver armour with its accents of black, with Loki’s hair loose around his shoulders and the fragment of Mjolnir hanging from his ear—

Loki looks _right_ like this, as right as he does in his usual armour. It looks correct, in its own way.

“Where did you get that armour?” Thor asks, and Loki’s hand goes to his chest. It’s glorious armour, and it isn’t the like of which Thor has ever seen, least of all on Loki’s form. It’s the armour of a hero, of a legend, and… Thor hates himself for thinking, but it certainly doesn’t belong to Loki.

“It’s mine,” he says, hurt showing in his face, as if he has read Thor’s thoughts before they might be voiced. “I haven’t… It isn’t stolen, Thor. This is _mine_.”  He inhales, and as he does so, the dripping silver shifts with his body, displaying the expansion of Loki’s lungs. Thor aches – why must he ache so?

“Why do you want to climb the mountain?” Thor asks softly.

“Because I don’t have anybody to talk to,” Loki says, shrugging his shoulders. “But I can still go for a walk.”

“There’s me.” Loki lets out a disbelieving sound, and he shakes his head.

“No, I don’t want to talk to _you_. And I’m not going to talk to Mother and Father, because whatever I say, I haven’t quite forgiven them for what they’ve done to me. And Fandral—” Loki shakes his head. “It would give him the wrong idea, were I to speak to him of what is on my mind.” He seems tortured by it, and he seems _small_ , despite the opulence of his armour.

“Why not?” Thor asks, surprised by how quiet his voice is, this time. “Why not me?”

“Because it would be cruel,” Loki murmurs. “And no matter what you think, Thor, I have always tried…” He trails off, and he looks down at the floor. “It has never brought me pleasure, brother, to be cruel to you. Never. There are things about me you do not know, and should not, for it is not your place to.”

“Forget my place,” Thor says, surprised by the thickness in his throat, the gruffness in his voice. “I’ll go with you.” Loki stares at him, for the longest few moments, as if he doesn’t believe him.

Then, he nods his head.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

Loki flinches violently away from his horse when it exits the stables. Mjeif huffs out a sound of surprise, staring at Loki with his brown eyes wide, and Loki nearly gags against the inside of his elbow, scrambling away. “ _No horses_ ,” he snaps, and Thor can see that he is trembling slightly, pulling himself up from where he has stumbled into the dirt and striding swift toward the dirt road.

Thor tethers Mjeif, and runs to take after him.

“What was that about?” Thor demands, and then he stops. Loki’s pale cheeks are tinged slightly green, and he looks as if he may be sick within minutes. “We should stop. Let you get your breath back.”

“I have more than sufficient breath, thank you,” Loki mutters, and he breathes heavily, evidently trying to drag his nausea back beneath his control.

“What happened to you?” Thor asks quietly. “What made you— How did he trick you? You said he made you watch me die, but…”

“I shouldn’t tell you,” Loki says desperately. “You’ll hate me if I tell you.”

“I could never hate you,” Thor murmurs, and he reaches out, catching Loki’s shoulder. The silver is cool to the touch, but not unpleasant, and he inhales softly as he feels it. Beneath it, he knows, Loki is warm and supple, but the silver is not… It isn’t _bad_. It feels almost organic itself, as if it is giving way slightly to the weight of his palm. “Loki, understand that, please. No matter what you do, what you _did_ , I will always love you – have always loved you.” His hand slides up, touching the side of Loki’s neck, clasping it, and he feels Loki relax, leaning into the tender touch. “Tell me what happened.”

Loki leans in, and Thor lets him, lets Loki capture his lips beneath his own, as his own hand catches Thor’s neck. His fingers are warm. He feels Loki kiss him deeply, soundly, a gentle claim, and then Loki pulls slowly away, sighing softly. Their hands remain in mirror image of one another, palms pressed against each other’s necks. Their slow heartbeats are synchronised, perfectly, and a warm glow spreads out from Thor’s chest.

“He put me in…” Loki sighs. “He put me into one thousand universes, Thor. And I lived every life, from start to end. I would be trapped in my own head, sort of. I could mostly choose how I occupied myself, or how I spoke, what I said, but many situations – at least one scene every day, sometimes several, sometimes the whole day – would be locked in stone. I would witness it as a prisoner within my own head, my lines, my actions, written for me. You see, those were the predestined ones, the… The keys to the future, as it were.”

“What sort of future?” Thor asks. Loki pulls his hand away.

“Come,” he says. “Let us walk. T’is some way to the base of the mount.”

“T’is shorter on horseback,” Thor says. Loki shakes his head, and he walks onward. Thor moves to fall into step beside him, and he feels the weight of Mjölnir at his side, familiar, constant. For an hour or so, they walk in silence, Loki’s gaze forward, his gait regular and easy. Thor doesn’t have it in him to interrupt the silence, and so he wonders what they will do – Loki had insisted he would not wait for Thor to pack a tent or saddlebags, to pack supplies more than a waterskein and what fits in his pack, nor even to summon Thor’s friends.

And so they walk alone, on this lonely road, the two of them.

“What was meant to happen next?” Thor asks. “In this universe?”

“I moved slowly through the void,” Loki answers softly. “A chunk of the Bifrost that had come away from the bulk of the bridge caught me in the neck – it nearly decapitated me, but my magic kept it on by a thread, and managed to partially heal the wound. But I fell through various portals, through tears between reality…” Loki’s eyes are distant, and Thor can see the swirl of colour within them, tortured with memory. “And I landed on a planet. It was very hot, too close to its sun, and for many days I laid rotting in the charred, black dirt, feeling the blood bubble away from my neck as the sun forced it to evaporate.” Thor inhales, very slowly, and he watches Loki raptly.

“And then?” he asks, in an undertone, as if speaking too loudly will curse the answer to come.

“I reached out with my magic, desperate for some kind of help. Desperate to contact _somebody_ …” Loki chuckles, slowly shaking his head at his own folly. “My call for aid was heard.”

“By whom?”

“Thanos,” Loki says. The intonation of the name comes heavy on the air, and Thor sees the way some of the trees shift around them, shaking slightly in their places, as if teetering on their roots. Do the trees fear Loki? Perhaps so. “From your perspective, at the time, I was gone from a year. When next you saw me, I was invading Midgard.” Thor frowns, his brow furrowing, and he tilts his head.

“Midgard?” Thor repeats. “Why?”

“Thanos made me choose between invading Asgard and invading Midgard, once I had an artefact of import from Midgard. I chose Midgard. Thanos had had dealings with a race named the Chitauri, and he had promised them a planet, so my goal was to open up portals to allow the Chitauri to land upon the Earth.” Loki exhales, slowly, and Thor thinks of what he has said, and he thinks of one particular phrasing that catches in his mind.

“From my perspective, you said,” Thor says, lowly. “How long from yours?”

“Decades,” Loki says.

“He tortured you?”

“Yes.”

“You didn’t want to invade Midgard.”

“Not especially.” Thor waits for him to continue. He doesn’t.

“And what then?” he presses.

“I had partly sabotaged the invasion,” Loki says quietly. “Ensured it wouldn’t take as Thanos had intended… And part of it was just bad luck – I tried to kill one particularly _obnoxious_ little Midgardian, Tony Stark, but he—” Loki wrinkles his nose. “Anyway. You brought me home, and Father imprisoned me beneath Asgard.”

“Imprisoned you?” Thor says. “But why? If you had been tortured, if you had been forced to invade, why would you imprison you?”

“That didn’t come up,” Loki says bluntly. “Because I didn’t tell you.”

“Why not?” Thor demands, furious, not merely at Loki’s slightly defensive, steadfast tone, but also at the very thought of it, at the very thought of Loki imprisoned, after decades of torture…

“I didn’t feel like it. I had no desire to explain myself to any of you, least of all Father. It was none of your business that I had been tortured, nor that I had been under duress. I felt…” Loki inhales, and he clasps his hands together before him. His gauntlets slide back onto his wrists, and his fingers interlink tightly. “I begged, on the Bifrost, Thor. That was me begging. And you didn’t— You couldn’t see it, Father’s face. He looked at me with such… Such regret. Not merely that he regretted my actions, not merely my madness, my crazed frenzy in attempting to lay attack on Jötunheimr, but regret of _me_. As his son. As anything.” There are no tears in Loki’s eyes: his expression is stiff, determined to be unfeeling. “I expected to be executed when I returned to Asgard, Thor. Father imprisoned me because he could not bear to swing the axe.”

Thor feels sick. He thinks of the way Loki had fallen from the Bifrost not two weeks ago, the pain in his blue eyes, the desperation in his voice, the _cry_ , and how Thor had seen his hand loosen on Gungnir before he had let it go… “You wanted to die?” Thor asks, in a small voice. “When you fell from— From the Bifrost?”

“Fell?” Loki repeats. “Thor… I let go. It was an attempt on my own life, as unsuccessful as it was.” Thor exhales, slowly. Loki’s expression betrays shame, and he looks forward again. They continue to walk forward, and Loki says, “Other things happened, but they— They are less important. The Convergence will still occur, and I know how to ensure our safety, when it comes upon us. But… Later on, this man, Thanos. He gathered together objects of great power, known as Infinity Stones, and he gathered them upon a gauntlet. His plan was to dash the universe in half – to kill half of the lives in the universe.”

“Why?”

“He was mad. In some universes I experienced, in others later on, Thanos did it because he worshiped death. In this one… He said it was for the sake of overpopulation. But that— The ramblings of a man confused, and more than slightly stupid. It made no sense at all. The universe is vast, and overpopulation has never been a concern – besides, the snap of his gauntleted fingers, it killed animals too, and plants.” Loki wrinkles his nose, shaking his head, and Thor sees the shift of his fingers before his belly, the way he drags and plucks at his hands, not quite hard enough to make them bleed – but close. “You died, Thor. At the hand of Thanos, before the final battle, and I was distraught. After Thanos’ snap, I went to a fellow who I knew was… Who I had long-since been involved with. I begged him to revive you, begged him. He would not do it unless I paid a price.”

“And that price was to bear his child?” Loki nods his head. His thumb drags hard enough over his palm to draw blood, and Thor sees it drip down his fingers, staining the dirt. It is red, now – the lilac it had been before has faded away, and he wonders if he ought question it, or not. He will question it later, he thinks, later… Thor reaches out, and he takes Loki’s hand. Not the bloody one, but the one that had caused the cut – he holds it tightly in his own, interlinking their fingers.

Loki looks at him for a long few moments, but then he relaxes into it, and he lets Thor hold his hand. His fingers are warm, and Thor can see the wound on his other hand slowly heal, the cut closing up and the blood sizzling away into the ether. Sickly, he thinks of the image Loki had painted, of him on some dead, charred planet, the blood bubbling from his neck—

“Did you love him?” Thor asks. “This fellow that you mention?”

“Please don’t ask me that,” Loki says.

“Alright,” Thor assents, after a reluctant pause, and they walk on in silence.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

“A thousand lives, you said,” Thor says, when they make camp that night. They have been walking all day, taking only short breaks to eat, and Loki has spoken little. Thor fills the silence instead, regaling Loki with tales the Warriors Three have told him, or tales and jokes he has overheard in taverns. Loki listens with a slight smile on his face, although sometimes he finishes Thor’s sentences, and Thor feels he knows the stories, although Thor has never told them before. “How were they different?”

Loki sits cross-legged before the fire, watching a rabbit he had caught roast slowly on its spit.

“It depends,” Loki says. “Sometimes, we were both here, of Asgard. Sometimes I was a true son of Odin, sometimes not. Sometimes, we had siblings. Sometimes, I grew up on Jötunheimr and you on Asgard, and we were enemies, or betrothed, or otherwise linked, from birth. Once, we were both of Jötunheimr, and we ruled Jötunheimr together. Sometimes, we were older; other times, younger. In many universes, our lives were influenced by the mythos the Midgardian have conjured for us… In many of them, I had other identities, held other titles, other names. In a handful, I was— Oh, I was countless people, held divinity on twenty-seven planets – can you imagine that? To twenty-seven planetfuls of people, I was an object worthy of worship.” Loki laughs a little, and the sound is soft and warm. It makes Thor’s heart beat slightly faster, to see the genuine _wonder_ in his eyes, on his face.

It fades quickly.

“The only thing that remained the same, from universe to universe, Thor, was our link. You and I, we were… We were connected, somehow. We were brothers, or lovers, or nemeses, but we were always connected, and that connection could not be broken, except by one thing.” Thor reaches out, gently stroking over Loki’s soft, black hair – he has stopped greasing it back, as once he did, and it is so much longer now… He adores the sensation of it, silky beneath his fingers.

“What thing was that?” Thor asks, and he dreads the answer – for good reason.

“Death,” Loki murmurs, and he presses his cheek into Thor’s palm, his eyes closed. “Always death.”

That night, Thor lies back on the sleeping pack Loki had conjured, and Loki rides him with his eyes closed, his head tossed back and his hands spread on Thor’s chest. The earring bobs as he fucks himself down, letting out the tiniest grunts and moans of pleasure, and when Thor comes, marks his brother from the inside, he is gratified to see the way he drips down Loki’s thighs. Loki’s orgasm is… something else.

When he comes, Thor can feel the sudden burst of heat that radiates from him, the way his blue eyes shine _gold_ , and for a second it is light he has Heimdall’s Allsight, as if he sees all—

It passes in moments, and Loki is tired afterwards, blanketing Thor’s form with his own. He sleeps soundly, tucked into the crook of Thor’s shoulder, his face pressed against his neck, and Thor is soothed into slumber by the regularity of his breathing, by the beat of his heart. This is what Thor has yearned for, for centuries upon centuries, his brother pressed against him just like this, and now he has it, and oh, it is better than he ever imagined! Loki is completely nude, uncaring of his nakedness even as Thor casts a lazy blanket over him, and this is how it should always have been, _always_. He and Loki, connected, sleeping side-by-side, never to be parted—

Except by one thing.

 _Always death_ , Loki had said. _Always death_.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

Thor is awoken by Loki shaking _violently_. He is shaking in his sleep, trembling, and Thor grabs hold of him tightly, holding him through it. Loki wails in his sleep, wails and cries, and it seems to take hours before he startles awake – and yet it can only have been minutes. Loki clutches tightly at the fabric of Thor’s sleep shirt, clinging to him, and he breathes in heavily, his eyes defocused.

“Nightmares,” Thor murmurs against his hair. “You are well, brother, you are safe.”

“Yes,” Loki says raggedly. “I suppose.”

He stumbles clumsily from the sleeping pack, and he bathes in a conjured raincloud before his silver armour appears once more on his skin, dripping over his flesh like liquid and sculpting itself to his body.

“What was it about?” Thor asks, as Loki cuts apart bread for breakfast. “Your nightmare?”

“Oh, nothing of import,” Loki mutters, shaking his head. “I have nightmares about all sorts – I always have.”

“You never used to,” Thor says. “Before the Bifrost.” Loki freezes. Thor sees the slight shift of his eyes, searching his own memories wildly, until he realises, perhaps, that Thor is right. That Loki used to sleep soundly, once upon a time, when he slept in his bed on Asgard.

“Pray, brother,” Loki says, a little shakily. “Collect for me some rosemary.” Thor nods his head, and he steps away. They eat their breakfast together – some eggs Loki had collected, as well as the bread – and Loki stares into the smouldering remnants of the fire, thoughtful, pensive.

“Something you wish to say?” Thor prompts, when Loki has closed his mouth for the third time, after opening it. Loki nods.

“Thank you,” he says, finally. “For insisting on accompanying me. It is merely…” He swallows. “I had forgotten, that before… Before I fell from the Bifrost, I had never had many nightmares. Merely that in every universe, every other one— I did. Perhaps because of the destiny that was to unfold.” Thor frowns, but before he can question that statement, Loki says softly, “It aches somewhat, this universe. You know, in others… In others I had connections. Friends. You know, in this universe, we have each other, and—” Loki stops his tongue, and he laughs breathlessly. “We have each other. But in other universes, we have other siblings. On Jötunheimr, I ought have been the youngest of three, after Helblindi and Byleistr. And on Asgard, why, there was Angela, and Baldr, and…” Again, the stop of the tongue. Loki’s smile is secretive, and full of pleasure. It is such a delight, to see that expression on his face, that Thor hasn’t it in himself to question it. Just days ago, he thought Loki dead, and now, to see him _smile_ … “And I had friends, too, sometimes. In other universes, there is another sorcerer here, _Amora_. The greatest witch Asgard has ever known. And I had wives, you know, in some… A person called Angrboða, a Jötunn. A Vanir woman, Sigyn. There were other women, in other universes, and men too. In one universe, you know, I married Dionysus, the Olympian, and—”

Loki exhales, slowly.

“It just made me realise,” Loki murmurs. “Coming back here, to this life, this Asgard, how lonely I always was. I only ever had you, Thor. In other universes, there were other siblings, or friends, or lovers, close _enemies_ even. But here, for nearly fifteen hundred years, all I have ever known – all I’ve ever loved – is you.”

“There is Fandral,” Thor says softly. “There is Mother and Father, there—” Loki holds up his hand.

“Fandral does not hate me,” Loki agrees, with a slow nod of his head. “But… We have never been _friends_. He has always been your friend, and mine second. And Mother and Father, they are not… I am talking of _other connections_ , Thor. Other people, equals, friends, on which I might rely.”

“And Heimdall?” Thor presses, slightly desperately. He cannot conceive of it – Loki, feeling lonely? But he ought never have felt lonely, not when Thor has always been here, always _been_ here…

“Heimdall does not love me, Thor,” Loki murmurs. He keeps his eye contact, looking Thor in the face, and somehow it makes it worse. “He feels duty toward me, even occasional affection, but— I could not speak to him, of a day. That is what I am trying to say, Thor. I’ve only ever had _you_ , and so when we fought, or when I felt uncomfortable speaking with you… I had no one.”

“But—” Thor clenches his fists at his sides, and he hates the monster that claws in his chest, hates his rage. “But you oughtn’t have _felt_ that way Why didn’t you try to reach out to somebody, make some friends of your own?” He realises he has raised his voice, because Loki has leaned slightly away from him, his lips pressed loosely together. “Were you…” Thor swallows. “Were you truly so unhappy? On Asgard? What you said to me, about— You said you eternally felt in my shadow.”

“Yes,” Loki says quietly.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Thor asks. “You never told me.”

“What would the sense have been in telling you?” Loki asks, simply. “ _Know your place, brother_ – how many times have you said that to me, in your lifetime? How many times have you reminded me that you are in command, and that I am but your second?”

“That isn’t the same thing,” Thor says immediately. Guilt flares within him with the force of a flame. “You— It isn’t my _fault_ , that people always preferred me to you.”

“No,” Loki agrees. “But even as a boy, people disliked me. They hated me by the time I reached my manhood. How could I find friends, when that was the case?”

“You were cruel, brother,” Thor reminds him, sharply. “Conniving, and—”

“Was I?” Loki asks. “As a child, I mean. Do you remember me as cruel?”

“Once,” Thor says, hurriedly, “you feigned being a snake, and when I picked you up, you stabbed me!”

“Once,” Loki replies, smiling fondly, “you threw me from Father’s balcony. I would have been dashed on the stones had I not thrown out wings and flew.” Thor swallows, and Loki chuckles, catching hold of his arm. “Thor, I say that not to shame you. We played roughly, as children – I would catch you with my daggers, you could catch me with a sword. We would wrestle. Once you had Mjölnir… How many times have you pinned me beneath its weight, leaving it my lap so that I could not move?” Loki’s fingers play slow over the fabric of Thor’s arm, dragging gently over the skin, soothingly. “As a child, do you recall me… Hurting insects, or animals? Hurting our friends? Do you remember me as aggressive, or loud, even? Was my rough play ever _cruel?_ ”

Thor is silent. He remembers Loki as a boy, remembers his mischiefs, his pranks – never harmful, never cruel, not really. His japery would be dangerous, at times, but never permanently so, and his deceptions, much the same. It wasn’t until the breaking point, not until Thor’s coronation…

“I’m not a good man,” Loki murmurs. “I’m a killer, and a liar, and a manipulator. I can be distant, and cruel. But as a child, Thor… I was just a child, like any other. And people disliked me all the same.” There is no bitterness in Loki’s voice. There is a simple frankness, and he sighs, shrugging his shoulders. “I don’t know, darling. Perhaps people hated me because they knew what I _would_ be… But I remember, when we met people, their excitement on seeing you, and how their faces would fall when they turned their attentions to me. It was always the _Mighty Thor_! …And his brother, Loki. It’s no wonder that when I reached Sakaar, that I…” He trails off.

“Sakaar?” Thor repeats. “Where is that?”

“We should keep walking,” Loki says, standing to his feet. “Come now, brother. Let us off.”

“I wish you would just _tell_ me what had happened,” Thor snaps, staring Loki in the face. “You beat about the bush, telling me naught, dropping small details, and here, here! You blame me for your loneliness, as a child, you blame me for the loss of your daughter, you—”

“Blame you,” Loki repeats, and he laughs, loudly and angrily, the sound echoing about them, through the trees. “You think I blame you? Blame _you_? I do not blame you for a thing, you fool! You know who I blame? _Me_. Me, and my foolish, _stupid_ self! Ever desperate, ever pathetic and so _wanting_ – wanting of power, of recognition, of a child, of my brother back! Well, now I have three of the four, brother, and I would give them all for the fourth.” The words ring between them, Loki’s eyes wide and desperate and with a shimmer of gold, and Thor can feel the power on the air, crackling between them. It fades, very slowly, and Loki sets his hand on Thor’s shoulder. “To tell you, brother, of how you pained me, simply by virtue of the fact that you were you, and I was myself… It would have caused you pain. You could no more have changed our positions than you might have changed the position of the stars. It would have been cruel of me, to tell you of my unhappiness, and ruin your own.”

“But you had no one else to tell, you just said,” Thor whispers. “How could it have been better, for you to be unhappy, alone, for centuries?”

Powerless, Loki stares at Thor, his lips parted.

“Let us off,” he says again, in a tiny voice. Thor inhales, slowly.

“Lead the way,” he says, and Loki does.

Ϟ ☼ Ϟ

“I apologise,” Loki says, out of the blue, when they sit down some time about lunch, as the sun is high in the sky. “What I said to you, about— I shouldn’t have said what I said, about choosing you over Va Nee. About regretting my choice.”

“Was it true?” Thor asks, lowly. Loki looks down at the silver plate of his trousers, delicately wiping his hands with a handkerchief.

“I shouldn’t have said it that way,” Loki says. “It was cruel.”

“But it was true,” Thor says, slowly. The guilt eats away at him, like the waves that greedily erode a shoreline. “You regret it.”

“She’s my daughter, Thor. If you had children— You’d understand, if you had children.” Thor stares at him, stares at the downturn of Loki’s lip, and understanding comes to him with the force of a blow, hitting him hard in the belly.

“In how many of the universes,” Thor asks, dreading the answer, and unable to prevent himself from voicing the question, “did you have children?” Loki says nothing. He says nothing, and he sets his chin upon his hands, looking mournful. _In too many of them_ , his eyes say. _In far too many of them_. “Come,” Thor says softly. “Let us off.”

Dumbly, Loki nods, and this time, as they walk, it is he that grasps at Thor’s hand, grasps it as tightly as he can.

**Author's Note:**

> Oh, golly, this is a fucked up 'verse. I'm excited about it, I really am. 
> 
> [Hit me up on Tumblr](http://dictionarywrites.tumblr.com/faq). Requests always open.


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